18. It Is aGreat Thing to Do Miracles, but It Is aGreater Thing to Live Virtuously.
18. It is a great thing to do miracles, but it is a greater thing to live virtuously.18
According to Aquinas, living virtuously is more marvelous than miracles! One might even say such living is itself a miracle. It is indeed a marvel (which is the primary meaning of “miracle”), a challenge, and an adventure. Virtuous living is worth a lifetime of effort.
One thing I appreciate about Thomas Aquinas’s teachings on ethics and morality is that he does not cheapen human adulthood or belittle our capacity for mature thinking by proposing that morality is about obeying rules all the time. Albert Einstein says a person “must consider it an insult when he is told that his conduct should be motivated by fear of punishment or hope of reward.”21 Aquinas does not overindulge in commentaries on the commandments, nor in threats and fear as a motivation for healthy actions. Instead, he develops a lengthy discussion on the Beatitudes, which Aquinas says “contain the whole process of forming the life of a Christian.” There “the whole perfection of our life is contained” (502).22
Aquinas celebrates a virtue of epikeia which is “knowing when to suspend the rules.” He treats adults like adults, and instead of proposing a “rule book” to follow he draws on the teachings of a “pagan” in his commentaries on Aristotle’s Ethics and Politics. This is significant for our times, for once again it demonstrates Aquinas’s Deep Ecumenism—that as human beings we all struggle with living lives of integrity, and that we can learn from one another. No single tradition or lineage holds all the answers to life’s ethical dilemmas. We can and must listen to one another, and sometimes even reach back into our histories to discover wisdom.
Following Aristotle, Aquinas chooses to build his ethics not on shoulds and don’ts, but on virtues, which he defines as powers. “Human virtue is a participation in Divine power,” he declares (350). He celebrates, therefore, our capacity for prudence and wisdom, for justice and love, for courage and fortitude, and—what strikes me as his favorite virtue—magnanimity.
By inviting us to develop our inner selves along the lines of certain virtues, Aquinas demonstrates that virtue is a lifelong effort. One is never fully there, and circumstances of culture and personal development (including one’s wounds and experience) will always affect our decision-making.
The proper objects of the heart
are truth
and justice.